Week 23! - Solar Car Challenge!

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a good week! I had a very good week in the lovely Freiburg! On Monday, I had to go to school, even though we didn’t have school that day. Our math teacher made us come in to take a math test because it was the only time that it would work. It was a little bit annoying because it meant I had to wake up early, but it was okay because after we took the test, I went into the city with Rahel, Leonie, and Larissa. Though it just seemed like a normal city trip, Leonie, Larissa and I had a goal. We wanted to secretly buy Rahel a dress for the ball while Rahel was there without her know so we could surprise her! It was a very fun challenge and we all had to work together to succeed. We had to distract her but also figure out what size she was without her realizing what we were doing. It was really funny at some points. We ended up spending a few hours in the city and we got lunch together. Next we wanted to watch the movie Everyday because on Thursday we had an English test on the book. We watched the movie in English so that they could practice their English, but I was also able to explain things as well. After we watched the movie we went over to Leonie’s house and worked on our Religion project. We have a presentation coming up that we needed to prepare for. Monday was a very productive, and busy day! But also a lot of fun! We also surprised Rahel with her dream dress as an early birthday present which was a lot of fun!

On Tuesday, I woke up early as always, but I didn’t know that we didn’t have school for the first 2 periods because Biology was cancelled. So I woke up early for nothing haha. After Biology we have latin, but since I didn’t have to go to Latin, I got to stay even later. Unfortunately, by the time I left it was raining really hard so I had to bike to school in the rain. But I had my rain jacket and I went fast so I didn’t get too wet. After school, I was very sweaty because I had just had gym class, so I showered. Then Renate and I went to the bank to figure out how to close my account in a few weeks. It’s pretty crazy that we’re already figuring out how to close my account. It feels like I just set it up!

Then, on Wednesday, I thought it was going to be a normal day of school, but boy was I wrong. Before we could even get into school, there were people all over squirting everyone with water guns. I got completely soaked! And because everyone has to walk through a gate to enter the school, everyone who walked in also had to go through the girls who had lipsticks and they were writing ABI on everyone foreheads. I was so confused about what in the world was happening until Rahel explained it to me. Basically, it was the last day of school for the 12th graders, so they had ABI strike, which basically means they can do whatever they want to on that day. 15 minutes later, when we finally got into the building, it was absolutely trashed. There were papers EVERYWHERE. It was all the papers from all the 12th graders for the entire year, and more. They had also put balloons everywhere, and pieces of tape all across the floor that you had to step over or else you’d trip. They had also made mazes out of chairs that everyone had to go through. It was madness! On top of all that, they were blasting music through the halls over the announcements and with speakers. I don’t think that would’ve been okay in the US. If there had been a fire or someone got hurt, there would’ve been a problem. But everyone was fine with it because it’s tradition. Finally when we were upstairs, we started math class. Math was the only class we had for the day because of this ABI strike. All the other classes were cancelled because of the ABI party and the ABI assembly. But because they don’t have an auditorium, we all just watched it on a live stream. But it was pretty bad quality so we just left early and went back home for lunch. For the rest of the day I worked on homework and relaxed. I also realized I had lost my favorite necklace :( I’m still not really sure what happened because it basically just disappeared, but I’m hoping it will show up later when I’m unfolding clothes or something. 

On Thursday we had our English test! We had to write our own additional chapter for the book we had just finished reading. Of course this was easy for me and it was actually a lot of fun. I think it went well for everyone else too. I’m excited to see how I did! After English I had the rest of the school day (as usual) and then I went home. Like the day before, I worked on homework and relaxed for the rest of the day. 

Then on Friday, I had a very normal day. I’m not a huge fan of the classes I have on Fridays, but it wasn’t terrible. In NWT we finished up working on our solar car, in history we were supposed to have a work day for a project, but we couldn’t have the computer lab so we weren’t very productive, and in Chemistry we talked about molecules and how they form. It was kind of a boring day. After school I was glad to be on the weekend! I spent the rest of the day relaxing. 

On Saturday I got to sleep in which was very nice. When I woke up I ate breakfast and watched a little bit of YouTube. I relaxed in the morning and also did a bit of art. Then, in the afternoon I went to my very last dance class! I can’t believe it’s already over! I’ve learned a lot and I can’t wait to teach my friends back in the US so I have someone to dance with. After dance it was pizza night at the park downstairs. So I ate 2 yummy pizzas and then I came back upstairs and watched Pirates of the Caribbean - At World’s End. I thought the first one was ok, but they are progressively getting worse in my opinion. I don’t really get why Anna likes them so much, but maybe I would like them better of I watched them in English. Overall a great day!

On Sunday I woke up and I had a busy day ahead of me! It was the Solar Car Challenge! We’ve been making a solar powered car in NWT for as long as I’ve been going to this school! We’ve been working really hard on our car, and today was finally the day to see how well we made it! Rahel and I carpooled with some of the other girls in our class, and soon enough we’d arrived! As soon as we’d got there, we started putting the final touches on our car. We did a few test runs on the track, but unfortunately it wasn’t really working. So we fixed what we could, but going into the competition we weren’t very confident. We also had to show our car to the judges and get registered. There were 49 other teams there which is a lot in my opinion. We got coupons for food, ice cream, and drinks and just like that it was time to start! In this competition our car had to be able to do a few things. It obviously had to be solar powered and we all had the same motor to make it fair. It also had to go through a tunnel so it had to have some sort of mechanism that could store energy for a short amount of time so it could keep driving without the sun. It also had to somehow switch directions and go backwards. You could just pick it up and turn it around, but that was very slow. The other way was to make it so that when it hit the other side, the impact caused the motor to switch directions. That’s what most groups did. There was a spring system that made it so when it hit the wall, a button was pushed that caused the motor to switch directions. Our car made it through the first round, second round, and third round so we were on to the semi-finals! We did not think we would make it so far so we were very excited. We made it further than anyone from our school and we were now in the top 9! Unfortunately that’s as far as we made it, but I’m still really happy for our group! 9th place out of 49 is pretty good! We also got honorable mention for design and honorable mention for technique. We didn’t win any prizes, but that’s ok. The lunch they provided for us was burgers, (or veggie burgers). I was a little disapointed at first because usually veggie burgers are not that good, but this was the best veggie burger I’ve ever had in my whole life! And it was free!  I also ate my ice cream which was delicious! Overall a great day! When I got back, I wrote my blog, and got ready for bed! 

Our car!

This is a video of our car! We are in the 2nd lane!

This is a video of the finale! They are very fast! The winner is in the 2nd lane! Very impressive!

My AMAZING veggie burger!

I hope you all enjoyed this week’s blog! I also hope you have a great week and I’ll talk to you all next week! As always feel free to email me with any questions or comments at laurelkrobbins@gmail.com Talk to you next week!